Bringing electricity to 600 million homes. (editorial rant)

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In this editorial piece I would like to shine a light on a particular individual who has transcended his status as “just another rapper”. In these incredibly selfish times where we seem to care about what the Kardashians are wearing (or not wearing) than helping others it is nice to know that someone is doing something to help others.

Rapper Akon is currently using his celebrity status in order to help people get electricity from one of the most sun drenched continents on the planet. All I have to say is … that is a lot of 12 volt solar panels and charge controllers.

This got me to thinking …

Why is it that we cannot do something like this in the United States. This would cut down on Global Warming, save a ton of money in oil costs and give us a sustainable way to help millions of people who are other wise disenfranchised from having good electricity.

Well the problem is …

Then my mind immediately went back to the reality of the situation and that is that Africa, while being one of the most conflict afflicted nations on the planet, probably does not have all of the red tape involved in the USA.

You see ‘Big Oil’ companies, love them or hate them, always go where the money is. In Africa there are a lot of natural resources, however, these natural resources are controlled by many factions and multinational corporations (a lot of whom eminate from the USA).

I would be willing to bet that of all of the natural resources that African’s mine, grow and harvest they are able to keep only a small percentage of that for themselves – big corporations probably keep the rest. The one thing that cannot be bought, copyrighted, trademarked or sold off is the Sun! We all share the Sun, it is one thing that no one will ever be able to monopolize. However, that does not stop the big oil companies from stifling progress on Solar Energy plants and research … which is killing us.

A problem that needs fixing

The US prides itself on being a free country, we pride ourselves on self-reliance and stick-to-it-tiveness … and yet we continue to allow foreign governments to dictate oil prices to us and we do nothing about it – even though we could tap the Alaskan pipeline. Like it or not we go to War for Oil, we make rich foreign enemies even richer, and then give them the means to kill us (Google Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran). Why do we continue to give money to our enemies, because we want their O-I-L! This needs to stop.

As Akon is proving, we can have sustainable Solar Energy production at a fraction of the cost of other energy production methods. We pay billions upon billions every year to countries who want to kill us, just so we can take advantage of the oil that they produce. This costs the United States billions of dollars every year in both ‘blood and treasure’ (as politicians love to say), while we cannot stop the corporate interests entirely, we can start a grass roots movement that can help us in the long run. According to recent numbers – the average home can save up to $30,000 dollars or more by switching to Solar (it’s true – Google it). Imagine if the whole country did that!

Of course, We cannot stop our reliance on oil entirely

I am not saying that we go ‘cold turkey’ on oil consumption, oil is a good source of energy and will continue to be for a long time, we just need more alternatives. This site is all about helping people and making the world a better place, people such as Akon are really doing just that. I salute Akon and his mission to provide electricity to millions. In the United States let’s also try to reduce our reliance on foreign oil and use the natural resources that we already have – maybe the Dept. of Energy could use Akon’s help.